


The Musician

by backtofive



Series: Japanese Folklore [1]
Category: Finder no Hyouteki | Finder Series
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Fantasy, Fluff, Historical, Historical Fantasy, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, M/M, Mythology - Freeform, Shapeshifting, Tanuki
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-08
Updated: 2015-11-08
Packaged: 2018-04-30 14:10:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5166728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/backtofive/pseuds/backtofive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was quite an upbeat and lively song that in any other occasion, would have actually been enjoyable. As of now, the seemingly never ending song was pissing off all of the overlord's bodyguards and servants. What made the matter worse was that none of them had any idea where the music was coming from, and absolutely no way to stop it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Musician

**Author's Note:**

> I made this fic based on old Tanuki japanese legends.
> 
> Tanuki (狸) gets mistranslated into English as all sorts of things, mostly badger or raccoon or the neologism “raccoon dog.” None of these really fit. Badgers (穴熊; anaguma) and raccoons (洗熊; araiguma) have their own Japanese names. I would say that it is an animal that is similar to a raccoon dog.
> 
>   
> Special thanks to my beta [Kinoshita1227 ](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Kinoshita1227/pseuds/Kinoshita1227%20target=)

It all began on a cold, winter night. Everyone in the city was ready to hit the sack, dead tired after a long battle to protect their land.

They would have been able to, if not for a certain incessant melody sounding across the entire city. It was quite an upbeat and lively song that in any other occasion, would have actually been enjoyable. As of now, the seemingly never ending song was pissing off all of the overlord's bodyguards and servants. What made the matter worse was that none of them had any idea where the music was coming from, and absolutely no way to stop it. One thing was for sure, the person who was causing this disturbance was definitely not normal. 

For an entire week, the whole city was 'entertained' by this nightly 'performance'. As the days passed by, the song changed. The song chosen was happy and joyous at the start, but over time, started becoming more and more melancholic. It seemed as though the musician was getting sadder and sadder by the day, as the music had become unbearably depressing by the end of the third week. Lord Asami was determined to ignore it and show his unwavering will power off, as well as to inspire his servants and soldiers to aim towards having such self-control and tolerance.

What Asami did not tell the population, was that none of his servants, not even Kirishima himself, could locate the secret musician. It seemed to change hiding spots all the time, making it near impossible for the royal guards to pinpoint an exact location, and hunt the nuisance down. Asami eventually came to the conclusion that it must be an intruder that somehow managed to get past his army stationed outside the gates of the city, every single night, without fail. 

Kirishima actually had a theory in mind, though it was rather far-fetched, and might risk his reputation of always being sensible. He dared not offer such an implausible explanation for the mysterious music - Lord Asami would surely never trust his reasoning again. Suoh knew what Kirishima was considering, and took it upon himself to inform their lord of it. The man in question was desperate for an explanation, even if a dubious one. Everyone was literally, and figuratively tired of the music.

 

*

 

"What? A Tanuki?"

"Y-Yes, sir." Suoh agreed, without averting his eyes.

"You know what?" Asami replied after a few minutes, sighing exasperatedly. "I don't care, just find the culprit and bring him to me.

Suoh nodded and immediately informed all the servants to search for a tanuki. It sounded strange, to say the least, but none of the servants were going to question their lord's orders. Everyone was too tired to have the energy to disobey. They searched high and low, and in every nook and cranny, including ones too small to fit a human. It was a tanuki they were talking about. 

Asami waited for his loyal man to leave his quarters before starting to search for the musical bastard himself. Lately, the music seemed louder and clearer than usual, so he had to be close. Asami opened every door, looked inside every basket, under stairs and other small places but still couldn't find it.

Then the music started again, this time louder than ever. Asami followed the sound, taking silent steps and stopping right at the corner next to the sliding door of his bedroom. The lord sat on his knees and sighed as he couldn't believe that the annoying intruder was right there, outside his bedroom. He did not know if it was courage or stupidity that drove him, but he was going to find out once and for all who his tormenter was.

Asami reached his hand out towards the rice paper screen and swiftly grabbed whoever was on the other side and pulled it into the room.

It was hard to tell who was more surprised by the turn of events. The man or the tanuki. Both stared at each other with shock written across their faces.

As it turns out, the musician really was a tanuki, not fat and chubby but still a lot more adorable than you would expect from the most annoying musician in history. The tanuki had a red cloth tied around his neck, a straw hat on his head, a hand drum in his hands and a wooden flute in his little mouth. And big, big eyes. 

"Is this for real?" The lord muttered and the little animal began to struggle frantically, whether scared or offended, time would tell. For now, the lord was just happy that his palace was finally in silence. Oh, glorious peace and quiet. 

Somewhere, the royal guards breathed a sigh of relief at the respite.

Lord Asami held the little tanuki by his red cloth and didn't seem to care that the creature was choking. "Are you going to behave, you brat, when I can put you on the floor?"

The 'brat' didn't stop struggling until he really felt like he was going to die. Reluctantly, it remained still.

"There, there," the lord said, putting the tanuki on its butt on the floor. "That's better."

Upon regaining its breath, the tanuki sat on the ground and looked around confusedly. Fear was evident in his expression as he thought about his fate now that he had been caught.

"Don't even think about running away, you mischievous little thing. You didn't let me and my men get any sleep for the past several days and I'm not going to let you off so easily." 

If tanukis could blush the lord was sure that the one in front of him would be blushing right now, averting his big eyes to look everywhere outside his face. 

"Now, will you shift back into your human form so we can talk?"

The tanuki hid his face with his tiny black hands but didn't move. However, his stomach proceeded to betray him by growling loudly with hunger. At that, he hid his whole head with his red cloth. Lord Asami tried not to chuckle. The tanuki, annoying as it was, was very endearing, and definitely embarrassed.

"I'm just going to get my servants to bring me some food since I'm a little hungry." He really wasn't. 

When the food came, the tanuki didn't move from its spot but lowered the red cloth to drool over the food.

"Do you want some?" Lord Asami taunted, smirking. But the little tanuki wasn't so easy to break and turned his head to look at the wall instead.

The Lord rose from his spot and grabbed a little bag heavy with coins. The tanuki wasn't able to look away this time. With that bag of coins, he could buy lots of sake in his human form. It was so unfair that this human could rub it in his face while he struggled to even get by.

"How about some money to get you to open your mouth and do some explaining?" The lord asked. Unfortunately for him, he couldn't use his favourite method of getting answers from the tanuki. They were supernatural beings and torturing them probably wasn't a good idea. 

The tanuki's eyes clearly shone at the sight of the money, but stood his ground. He was stubborn as hell. 'Not as stubborn as me,' lord Asami thought.

The servants entered the lord's quarters again, ignoring the rather cute tanuki sitting in front of their master. This time round they were carrying a tray with a sizeable sake jug filled to the brim. 

"Since you're in that form, I guess I'll have to drink all this good sake by myself."

The tanuki's eyes couldn't get any bigger, all sparkling with hope.

Lord Asami was a serious man. A merciless, respected and powerful man. He wasn't used to laughing, or smiling, and hadn't in a long time. He surprised himself when he chuckled upon seeing little black fingers trying to reach for the sake jug.

"Oh no, you don't, little sir. First, present yourself in your human form." Asami moved the jug out of the tanuki's reach, watching as his face fell and his eyes droop.

The little intruder was completely, and utterly defeated. He seemed to do a little sigh thing in tanuki form, and placed a leaf on its head. In a sudden pink cloud, the figure of an young blond man emerged. He had a straw hat on his head and a red cloth on his neck, but other than that was stark naked.

"Oh, there you go." Lord Asami said, appraising the human in front of him. "Way prettier without all that fur."

The tanuki, in the form of a blond haired, blue eyed teenager blushed, not amused at all.

"I can't help but notice that your balls are rather small for a tanuki." Asami smirked evilly. 

The boy blushed even harder and covered his private parts with his red cloth. "I... I am a youkai you perverted human! Can't you respect me?"

Asami scoffed. "You sure weren't respecting me and my men while bothering the whole castle with your depressing song all night long. Humans needs to sleep, you know. Don't you ever need to sleep?"

The boy smiled guiltily, briefly murmuring, "I love to sleep."

He was too cute to resist and Asami eyed him from head to toe. He was so beautiful, youkai or not.

"Why were you playing at night anyway? Were you trying to drive us crazy with your music?"

The youkai pouted and the lord almost jumped on him to nibble on those yummy pink lips. "It was a presentation! Can't humans appreciate good songs!?"

"They were depressing." The lord replied.

"That's because I was sad!"

Asami smirked. "I am pretty sure I can make you feel good within a couple of minutes, but only if you give me the whole night as well..."

The boy covered his ears with his hands, blushing all over again. The lord had to make a conscious effort not to jump him right there and then. 

"Tell me your name, honorable tanuki san, and why were you so sad? Were you feeling lonely?"

"My name is Akihito! I am actually half human, half youkai."

"And is that why you don't have giant nutsacks?"

Asami was riling him up again and it was so cute and delightful to see him get all angry.

"Yeah! That's right! That's why I don't have giant nutsacks and I'm so damn poor, alright! I'm sad because I have no sake..." He drifted off, forlorn expression overtaking his features.

The lord smiled. "Did you expect to get money with your presentations? Is that why you were wandering around my quarters?"

Akihito lowered his head. "I was playing for you. If you give me money to buy my sake, I would gladly walk away."

"Until you run out of sake again?"

The boy giggled. That was true.

"I could give you some good sake right now, my cute Akihito. But you're already naked and if you're drunk I'll end up taking advantage of-"

"I don't care!" Akihito reached out for the sake. "Just give me the sa- wait a minute, I am not yours." He frowned.

"Oh, but you will be..."

"What? How?"

"I can... Give you an endless supply of top rate sake, lots of money, and lots and lots of victims for your pranks." The lord leaned closer to Akihito with every word, lips just barely touching. 

"Are you trying to seduce me?" The boy asked, bright blue eyes still sparkling.

"It is working?"

Akihito pretended to think for a moment, tapping his chin with his forefinger. He winked at Asami and gave a cheeky smile, before replying "It is!"

The lord smirked in response, and couldn't help but capture the boy's yummy lips right then.

 

Outside the sliding door, Kirishima Kei and Suoh Kazumi were standing facing towards each other, arms and faces scratched and bleeding. Both of them were holding small wooden cages filled with furious tanuki inside. They stared at each other in shock. Was all that dangerous hunting for aggressive tanuki for naught? They had captured so many animals when the target was right in the castle all along. 

Upon hearing their master say "and a lots and lots of victims for your pranks" the men exchanged a silent look as the same thought crossed both of their minds.

They were so screwed.

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  As yokai, tanuki are known to have several magical powers and interesting traits. They are henge, shape-shifters, with abilities on par with and sometimes even exceeding those of kitsune (foxes), the most powerful of Japan’s magical animals. Tanuki are also famous for their belly drumsand their love of sake, food, and generally being the lazy, loafing tricksters of Japanese folklore. And their giant balls(!?).
> 
> Tanuki appeared in early encyclopedia starting from the 1600s, these early works are only collections of animals, and rarely mention tanukis’supernatural powers.
> 
> There are different versions of Tanuki legends over the time, so I made my version based on some (most) of traits, like when you know a fairy tale but there are diferent details every time you listen to the story.
> 
> The big round stomach and accompanying belly-drumming didn’t become attacked to tanuki lore until the 18th century. Several stories of tanukis’ belly-drumming appear around this time, although their famous nut sacks are still regular size. After some time appeared several legends about Tanuki having giant nutsacks (!). 
> 
> Why the giant nutsacks?  
> In biological terms, tanuki scrotums are rather large. This is an evolutionary trait to help the randy males succeed in the fierce competition for mates. And from a metalworking perspective, tanuki scrotums were both soft and strong enough that they could take the heavy pounding and stretch out to extraordinary size. It was said that, using a tanuki scrotum, even a small piece of gold could be stretched out into an 8-tatami mat big sheet of gold leaf. 
> 
> Because of this, tanuki scrotums became known for their ability to “stretch” money and make it go further. Savvy marketers started telling tales of the magical properties of tanuki scrotums, selling them as good luck charms and wallets telling buyers that the scrotums would “expand their wealth” in the same way they stretched nuggets of gold into massive sheets.
> 
> Once the myth of tanuki and their magical, giant balls hit the cities, the imagination of Edo period artists went wild. It really was too good of an idea, and made much too interesting of a motif, so artists expanded on the “stretching scrotum” idea. Suddenly, tanuki were using their nut sacks as weapons, sail boats, swimming pools, fishing nets, umbrellas … there was no limit. All of the great artists of the ukiyo-e period got in on the fun, out doing each other with even more outrageous pictures of tanukis’ magical scrotums.
> 
>   
> Aki has little nutsacks in this story, that's why he is so damn poor.
> 
> The familiar tanuki that we know today—with the prodigious belly, straw rain hat, sake bottle, and pendulous testacles—is a relatively modern invention. It actually comes from the 20th century.
> 
> This fic specialy was inspired in two different stories. 
> 
> The Belly Beating Tanuki (Eighth year of Meiji (1875)) about the tanuki that entered the house of a man who kindly let him get in under his porch to hide from whatever was chasing after him (probably a dog or something). The said Tanuki did his belly drumming thing for the whole night not letting anyone sleep (lol). 
> 
> And the legend reported by a real newspaper (17th year of Meiji on the 28th day of May, the Yubin-Hoichi Shinbun) about a family that kept a baby tanuki as a pet and that they could hear the baby tanuki practicing beating out rhythms on its belly. The wife wanted to see what her pet was up to, and snuck in one night to spy on it. She said the baby tanuki was spread out flat on the tatami mats, with all four legs splayed wide and its nose pressed firmly on the ground. She could hear sounds of something like a flute and a hand drum coming from the tanuki.  
> Of course what I made was a adaptation for cuteness purposes, flute and hand drum is way cuter than belly drum. SUE ME!
> 
> The rest of the tanukis’ outfit—the straw hat, sake jug, and pay slip—didn’t show up until even more recently (1912-1926).  
>    
> Tanuki seem to enjoy imitating the self-important figures of human society in general. They’re also said to impersonate government officials. They’ll knock on your door, harassing you into pay your taxes. Or they’ll accuse you of some imaginary infraction of the law.
> 
> Tanukis love to shapeshift into objects too. They can disguise themselves as trees, stone lanterns, and even the moon. They love to do the moon trick when the moon is out. It makes people think they’ve gone crazy.
> 
> Most of this notes are translated and Sourced from Mizuki Shigeru’s Mujyara, Japanese Wikipedia, Japan Times, OnMark Productions, and Kaii Yokai Densho Database  
> I didn't create these myths lol, only the fanfic. Of course you know, Akihito and Asami belongs to Yamane Ayano.


End file.
